Video Games

I have been working on building a place for people to build and share their digital pokemon teams, and version 0.1 is out. Please check it out and give me feedback, as i’m going to continue working on it for a long time!

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I started Darksiders 2 expecting a 10 – 15 hour game, but what I got was a game much much longer than that. The game ended up taking me 27 hours to complete, and I didn’t even come close to completing all the side quests. I played the game on the PC after finding a great deal on Steam over Christmas. The PC port is very basic, with basically no graphic options, and runs at the same resolution that it does on the consoles. The game definitely lacks attention to detail in some areas especially texturing of environments, but you quickly ignore all that when you get sucked into the world.

What I liked:

I love the loot, every battle had me running around checking each item and changing my loadout.

Death’s abilities, I love how different the character could play, I chose to be more focused on leveling up minions to do my fighting for me.

The combat feels so good, simple enough yet still feels like you need to be strategic especially in harder areas.

The puzzles, always feel fresh and different, even though some are repeated throughout the game. I love the “Zelda” feel of the dungeons.

The world is amazing, it feels giant and sprawling, with hidden things everywhere.

Traveling through time, although very basic felt really cool

What I didn’t like:

Loot really doesn’t change appearance enough ( just slightly )

Boss battles, really are basic, but they are passable

Dust doesn’t actually seem to help out as much as I would of liked, there are times he would lead me through endless loops.

The ending was very disappointing for me, I was hoping for a grand reunion between Death and War.

Texture quality on PC

You have to have your controller plugged in before starting the game, or your stuck with Keyboard and mouse controls

I truly will miss this franchise, and I am really sad that THQ is no more, especially after having worked with that publisher with a few of the titles I’ve worked on. I hear the developers from Vigil were snatched up by Crytek, so hopefully something else amazing will come.

I would recommend anyone interested in Darksiders to definitely play this one, but be ready for a fairly long game, although the high points definitely outweigh the lows.

Until next time, let me know what you think of this game.

Adam

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AirMech is game that I stumbled upon because Amazon was running a special where any digital download purchase of video games got you a free 9.99 bundle for AirMech. I honestly didn’t even know the promotion existed until I saw it in my email. So I jumped on and downloaded it, later again on Steam, since I prefer just keeping all my games there. Anyway the game is fantastic, I’ve been playing it for the last few days, and have already powered through to Level 11.

You play a mech unit that flys and can transform into a giant mech warrior to jump into the ground battle. You select a load out of turrets, units, bombs, and misc other things before going into battle. Some items are only purchasable after reaching a certain level in the game. The game levels up similar to League of Legends, where you have an overall level outside the game, and in each game you start at level 1, and continually level up your mech and unlock items from your load out to now make at your outposts. Units are built and picked up by your mech at any of your owned bases. You can give units orders or just drop them off into a battle and they will start attacking immediately. Start off by playing solo against the computer, as its the easiest way to understand to get the feel for everything.

The thing that really impresses me in this game is the amount of depth it offers. In fact I’ve enjoyed it so much that I dropped $10 for a package deal they were offering so I could unlock some of the items a bit faster. Anyway I highly suggest everyone tries this game out. The game is still in beta, and appears to be constantly updated with new items and cosmetic treats. This is the perfect mix of MOBA and Starcraft 2, and I really want to see this games community grow.

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Starcraft 2 Heart of the Swarm is quickly approaching release so I want to take some time and preview the differences I’ve noticed after playing a lot of the Beta. Please note this is a beta so things I write about may no longer be valid in the build your playing or the final shipped version.

My Starcraft 2 History

I have played Starcraft 2 WOL since release mainly as Terran. I do have an account for each race though. I have roughly 4000 games of 1v1 played in Wings of Liberty. I have reached Masters 2 seasons as Terran, while Diamond is my highest ranking for Protoss and Zerg.

I have had the HOTS beta for a little over a month now and have roughly 100 games played so far. I have played as all 3 races, although I am still more skilled with Terran.

New Units

I know the one thing everyone wants to hear about is the new units. I have played with and against all the new units so I’ll start going through one by one.

Battle Hellion

The battle hellion is the normal hellions transformation that makes it endure more damage.

Initially I was really excited about the idea of the battle hellion, but I feel like it fails to accomplish what it was set out to do which is make mech viable again. The battle hellion is a great at absorbing damage and the fact that it can be healed by medivacs is insane, but sticking it into a ball of bio just doesn’t work as I was hoping. (more…)

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I started playing Max Payne 3 on the PC, and found it to be near unplayable because of a bug that causes the player to freeze in cover. This really needs to fixed ASAP, I searched the internet and found tons of other posts claiming the same issues for as long as a month ago. This really surprises me coming from a company like Rockstar, this should of never made it out to the storefront, and if it did sneak by the bug should of been fixed immediately. Please Rockstar fix this bug, the only solution I know of right now is to restart from checkpoint. Some people claim rolling out of cover works as well but that doesn’t always fix it for me.

The game is beautiful and really challenging, just the type of game I want to play, but with this bug it makes me regret my purchase.

The game is really fun when it doesn’t come to a screeching halt with a horrible freeze bug.

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I unfortunately did not get the chance to play all the big games from 2012, so the first list I want to put out there is the games I plan on playing in 2013 that came out in 2012.

To begin with I want to start with the top 5 games from 2012 that I didn’t have the chance to play yet.

#1 Mass Effect 3

I absolutely loved Mass Effect 1 and Mass Effect 2, so I can’t believe I haven’t had the chance to play this game yet. This is one that I hope to play very soon, and I have no doubt this would make my top 10 for 2012 if I had finished it. Mass Effect 2 was such an improvement over 1 that I can’t wait to see where things have moved in 3.

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Over the weekend I finished my first play through of XCOM: Enemy Unknown, so I wanted to share my impressions of this classic remake.

I have worked on games for the last 7 years, and last year the company I was currently employed at was finishing up Scary Girl for XBLA, PS3, and Steam, so I felt like it was time to start looking for another job. One of the lead engineers contacted me to see if I was come to work on some mystery project. At the time I was super hyped about getting the chance to go work at Firaxis, but after talking it over with my wife and family they felt it best that we stay here in Wisconsin while my wife finished up her nursing degree. After finding out what this “mystery project” was it makes me highly regret not trying for the job. Although I really hate interviews its a killer on the nerves, and generally everything that can go wrong does for me when I fly out to one, but thats a different story so there is no guarantee I would of gotten it, but I’d like to think I would of. (more…)